Shearing: Hawke's Bay A&P Society manager learns at fast clip

Sally Jackson learns the finer points of shearing from her trainer and mentor Colin Watson-Paul. Photo / Duncan Brown

The newish general manager of the Hawke's Bay A&P Society is learning to shear them.

She was challenged to learn to shear at the Royal Agricultural Society conference a couple of months year by Geoff Bone, her counterpart at the Canterbury A&P Society.

"It came up in a casual conversation at the conference."

So when Shearing New Zealand Hawke's Bay boss and show shearing organiser Colin Watson-Paul had his gang at the Tomoana showgrounds shearing sheep there it was natural to ask him to teach her.

And he is.

Sally is about six weeks into her training and coming along nicely, he says. "We will have to step up the training soon, though."

She and Geoff Bone plan to shear a sheep at each other's shows, Hawke's Bay in October and Canterbury in November.

"It's also been suggested we enter the novice class at the Golden Shears competition. I'm not so sure about that."